Carlsen, Caruana Lead 18 Confirmed Players For Total Chess Pilot In Budapest

Carlsen, Caruana Lead 18 Confirmed Players For Total Chess Pilot In Budapest

World number-one GM Magnus Carlsen and GM Fabiano Caruana headline the first 18 confirmed players for the Total Chess World Championship Tour Pilot, November 10-21, in Budapest, which will test a new format combining fast classical, rapid, and blitz chess.

Eight of the world’s top 10 and 14 of the top 30 appear in the initial lineup announced by the organizers on Tuesday. The 24-player event will take place at the five-star Anantara New York Palace Budapest Hotel. The remaining six participants are set to be announced in September.

The tournament in Budapest is a test for the FIDE-approved Total Chess World Championship Tour, a four-event annual circuit scheduled to launch in 2027 and crown the first combined champion in all three formats. The event was originally scheduled for October but has now been moved to November to avoid a clash with the U.S. Chess Championships.

The Anantara New York Palace Hotel in Budapest will host the Total Chess World Championship Pilot in November. Photo: Official site.

"I look forward to playing the Total Chess World Championship in Budapest this year," Carlsen said. "It’s always interesting to try out new formats."

It’s always interesting to try out new formats.

—Magnus Carlsen

Norway Chess/Total Chess CEO Kjell Madland is excited for the event: "The Budapest Pilot represents far more than another elite tournament. It is the first step towards creating a truly global championship ecosystem."

The field also includes GMs Vincent Keymer, Wesley So, Anish Giri, Nodirbek Abdusattorov, Arjun Erigaisi, and Alireza Firouzja, which means only two players from the August top 10 are missing.

Two of the world's leading women are also competing: GM Vaishali Rameshbabu, who won the 2026 FIDE Women’s Candidates Tournament, will be joined by the player who finished half a point behind her, three-time Women’s World Blitz Champion GM Bibisara Assaubayeva.

# Player Federation Age Rating World Rank 1 Magnus Carlsen 35 2823 1 2 Fabiano Caruana 34 2792 2 3 Vincent Keymer 21 2767 5 4 Wesley So 32 2765 6 5 Anish Giri 32 2764 7 6 Nodirbek Abdusattorov 21 2762 8 7 Arjun Erigaisi 22 2759 9 8 Alireza Firouzja 23 2757 10 9 Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu 21 2750 12 10 Jan-Krzysztof Duda 28 2743 13 11 Richard Rapport 30 2729 18 12 Hans Niemann 23 2725 21 13 Ian Nepomniachtchi 36 2719 24 14 Maxime Vachier-Lagrave 35 2713 28 15 Haik Martirosyan 26 2662 54 16 Vladislav Artemiev 28 2653 65 17 Bibisara Assaubayeva 22 2538 5 (Women) 18 Vaishali Rameshbabu 25 2489 14 (Women)

Vaishali’s brother, reigning Norway Chess Champion GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu, said: "It's an exciting format which challenges players to show their best performance in all three classical, rapid, and blitz formats. Looking forward to being part of the first edition."

Some notable players are missing compared to the list of qualified players, but it's hardly a surprise to see Classical World Champion, GM Gukesh Dommaraju, and his challenger GM Javokhir Sindarov absent as they will begin their match in Geneva, Switzerland just four days after the conclusion in Budapest.

Also missing is GM Hikaru Nakamura, who is third on the August rating list. Nakamura earned the right to receive an invitation through rating, but criticized the new championship, describing its name as "clunky" and the concept as "total fluff" in a video on his YouTube channel.

The Format

The pilot begins with a nine-round 3+2 blitz Swiss, but its results will not determine who advances. Instead, the tournament will establish the tiebreak order for the group stage that follows. The 24 players will then be divided into four groups of six for five days of classical chess with a time control of 45 minutes plus a 30-second increment. Each group is a double round-robin, giving every player 10 games of fast classical chess.

Every player advances to a four-player knockout bracket, but the group standings determine which positions they can contest. The four group winners enter the top bracket and play for first through fourth place, the four runners-up compete for fifth through eighth, and so on down to the sixth-place finishers.

According to the published regulations, each knockout match is played over two days. On each day, the players contest four 3+2 blitz games, two 15+10 rapid games, and one 45+30 fast classical game. The disciplines are weighted heavily toward the longer games as a win in blitz is worth one point, a rapid win four, and a fast classical win eight, with half those totals awarded for draws. An armageddon game will decide any match that remains tied.

Pilot Before 2027 World Championship

The first FIDE World Combined Champion will be crowned in 2027, when the minimum annual prize fund is $2.7 million, including at least $750,000 for each of the first three tournaments and $450,000 for the four-player final, plus performance bonuses. The prize fund for the Budapest pilot has not yet been announced.

The project was approved by FIDE in October 2025 and is developed, owned, and operated by Norway Chess. The agreement between the two organizations is set to run for at least 16 years.

"Chess is an incredible game," said Manchester City striker Erling Haaland. Photo: Jonathan Turton.

Chess.com covered how the tour has attracted financial backing from global superstar Erling Haaland, who joined as an investor in Norway Chess earlier this year. The company completed a $10 million funding round involving several Norwegian sports and business figures.

Previous coverage: